Why the Problem with Learning Is Unlearning

For many years the National Safety Council would publish warnings that such-and-such a number of people would die on the nation's highways each holiday. And they did. A very bright man, Dr. Harold Mendleson explained why the warning didn't work. He explained that everyone thought it would be "other people" who would die. They wouldn't because they were all excellent drivers. Only the bad ones died in traffic accidents. He also explained that you couldn't teach people to be better drivers until they were convinced that they weren't as good as they thought they were. Thus was born the National Driver's Safety Test during which driving situations were televised and paused while people responded with how they would react. The video resumed to demonstrate how they'd die if they made the wrong choice. At that moment only, they were open to leaning something new. They were in a state of cognitive dissonance; that is, reality was out of sync with their beliefs

TRUTH!

Reprogramming is the mother of personal growth! If you can master it, you'll have NO limits. If you can't master it, success will be elusive at best...

I like the article overall, but what the author is advocating for is NOT "unlearning". Unlearning would REPLACE prior mental models. What he is advocating is clearly & explicitly ADDING additional mental models and making a reasoned decision to use the appropriate model (or noticing that you need to go find yet another model...).

Using the driving in the UK example, you still want to hold onto the ability to drive in the US.....

That said, the ability to be agile in your thinking and adopt differing mental models for different situations is key to long-term success.